Council of Europe

18 results arranged by date

The Committee to Protect Journalists has joined the Council of Europe's platform to protect journalism and promote the safety of journalists. The Strasbourg-based body set up the reporting system earlier this year as a way to hold its 47 member states responsible for responding to attacks against journalists.

New York, August 29, 2014--The Committee to Protect Journalists strongly condemns the savage beating of Ilgar Nasibov, an independent journalist and human rights defender based in the Nakhchivan Autonomous Republic (NAR)--a mountainous exclave of Azerbaijan where the practice of journalism is severely restricted.

New
York, May 15, 2014--The eight-year prison term given today to a journalist in
Azerbaijan is a breach of the country's declared commitments to press freedom,
the Committee to Protect Journalists said today. Parviz Hashimli is the editor
of the independent news website Moderator
and a reporter for the independent newspaper Bizim Yol.

On Wednesday, Azerbaijan will assume chairmanship of the Council
of Europe Committee of Ministers. The chairmanship process is automatic; the
position is rotated every six months among all of the council's members, in
alphabetical order. But Azerbaijan's chairmanship has proven more problematic
than most, as it comes at a time when the country's fulfillment of its Council
of Europe obligations is at its worst.

On World Press Freedom Day, CPJ calls for the release of all jailed journalists

By Shazdeh Omari/CPJ News Editor

New York, April 29, 2014—Uzbek editor Muhammad Bekjanov has been in jail for 15 years, one of the longest imprisonments of journalists worldwide. Prominent Iranian journalist Siamak Ghaderi was imprisoned in 2010 and has been beaten and whipped in custody. Vietnamese blogger Nguyen Van Hai, serving a 12-year jail term, could barely walk or talk during a prison visit in July 2013, his family said.

New York, April 21, 2014--A court in Baku today ordered journalist
Rauf Mirkadyrov, Turkey correspondent for the independent Azerbaijani newspaper
Zerkalo, to jail for three months
pending trial on espionage charges after he was deported from Turkey, news
reports said.

New
York, March 17, 2014--The Committee to Protect Journalists condemns a five-year jail term given today to Tofiq Yaqublu, an Azerbaijani journalist
with the opposition daily Yeni Musavat, and calls on authorities to
overturn the verdict on appeal. Yaqublu, who was convicted of "organizing
mass disorder," was arrested in January 2013
in connection with anti-government protests in the town of Ismayilli. He was
covering the protests at the time of his arrest, his colleagues said. The
journalist is appealing the verdict.

New
York, December 9, 2013--The Committee to Protect Journalists condemns the
10-year jail sentence given today to Azerbaijani journalist Nijat Aliyev, and
calls on authorities to release the journalist on appeal.

New
York, November 14, 2013--Authorities in Azerbaijan should release on appeala
journalist sentenced to four years
in jail on trumped-up charges of hooliganism, the Committee to Protect
Journalists said today. The conviction comes as Azerbaijan is scheduled to
assume the rotating chairmanship in the Strasbourg-based Council of Europe in
May.

"We in Europe are also not perfect," José Manuel
Barroso said last week while
hosting a joint press conference in Brussels with Azerbaijan's head of state,
Ilham Aliyev. The president of the European Commission, who is supposed to
defend the EU's democratic values, seemed to prove his own point by deciding not
to openly question his guest's rosy picture of Azerbaijan's human rights
record.